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The Cheyenne River and Standing Rock Sioux requested the temporary injunction last week after Texas-based Energy Transfer Partners got federal permission to lay pipe under a Missouri River reservoir in North Dakota. That's the last big section of the $3.8 billion pipeline that would need to be constructed before it could carry oil from North Dakota to Illinois.

The tribes say the pipeline would endanger their cultural sites and water supply. They added a religious freedom component to their case last week by arguing that clean water is necessary to practice the Sioux religion.

The company called the religion argument a "last-minute delay tactic."